Tomorrow
by TNWanderer
Summary: SxL. “Last night, Lelouch, this is our last night... Please show your true self to me at least here, at least when we are like this... Cry, dammit, yell, curse me... struggle... just do anything but... not this... Lelouch... please..." R2 SPOILERS, YAOI.


**AN: **_How many times I cried as I wrote this, I forgot. I am blaming writing this sentimental piece of shit on the songs I listened to as I wrote this:_

_Nick Cave&Kylie Minogue – Where Wild Roses Grow_

_Nancy Sinatra – Bang Bang_

_Aerosmith – I Don't Want to Miss a Thing_

_Pain of Salvation -- Undertow_

_Oh, and let me tell you that the boys are terribly OOC and every moment of this is sappy and crappy as hell...-I have never been a good CG writer- You could feel disgusted._

_I wrote this without even watching episodes 24 and 25... I can't bring myself to... This fic assumes that they both die, yet I can't help but delude myself in believeing that Suzaku is continuing living as Zero, and Lelouch is riding his cart to an unknown land, with C.C. resting behind it..._

_So any inconsistencies in place and time should be overlooked, please._

_-_

**Tomorrow**

**-**

The room was cold.

In the dim illumination that the pale crescent of the moon shed, everything seemed still, frozen, and simply...dead.

The Ninety-ninth Emperor of the Holy Brittania was sitting at the edge of his bed, head bowed, eyes closed, hands clasped in silent contemplation. There was a small smile on his pale lips. A smile that could only be suitable for a man who knew he had nothing left to lose and nothing left to hang onto. An accepting smile, a surrendering one, as if in await of the inevitable.

Lelouch, who was now neither a vi Brittania, nor a Lamperouge, was aware that it was an unsightly smile, one he never wore before anyone, before any impossibilities or hardships that blocked his way. It was so unlike of him, but he was alone now in this cold room; so no one was there to witness how broken it was, how weak it made him look.

It was a smile that cried in behalf of his closed eyes.

His hands felt icy on his lap, fingers slightly trembling, palms clammy with cold sweat. Not that because he was afraid of tomorrow. Not that he dreaded playing out his part in the little farce he and Suzaku would stage before the world. But because... Oh... Because...

He never remembered a time that he thought his heart would give up on him before its planned time. Cold, he felt so cold that an icy grip was -slowly but surely- spreading from his stomach, crawling up to his spine and clutched at his heart.

He bit his lip, until he tasted his own warm blood at the tip of his tongue.

It tasted sweet.

He knew that it would taste much more sweeter in the mouths of the millions who demanded the blood of this rotten, selfish, vile, cruel emperor. Well, they would get what they desired... Tomorrow... His last tomorrow.

Their script had been written long before, they promised each other to present their most perfect performance; without blinking an eye, without a tremor in their voices, without a tremble in their limbs. He knew he had demanded so much from Suzaku, since he would be the protagonist of their closing show. But no one would be able to read in between the lines of their farce to understand that it was in fact a tragedy and there was no hero to begin with, there was no evil to be conquered, no trophy to be gained, no happily ever after of those stupid tales.

Only, two childhood friends killing each other. One would literally do so, the other in the most figurative way imaginable.

Yet, Lelouch knew that he owed this to everyone, to Nunally, to Suzaku. Especially to Suzaku, from whom he robbed lots of things, he felt obliged to hand the proverbial sword which would take his life, into his hands. Maybe that would soothe him somehow, maybe he could atone his sins as least partially.

And if it was Suzaku, really... Lelouch really didn't mind it...

He just felt cold.

The door to his room slowly opened with a creak. Lelouch opened his eyes in surprise and saw the dark figure sliding though it soundlessly. His back stiffened. No, he didn't want to see him now, not before it, not before his last tomorrow.

Yet, there stood in the dark shadows of his room, Suzaku, closing the door slowly and locking it behind him.

His heart ached miserably in his chest as those green eyes of his childhood friend locked with his violet ones. Coldly... Emotionlessly...

_'So, the face you want me to close my eyes on is this, Suzaku?'_ Lelouch thought as he slowly rose from his bed and turned his face away, trying desperately to remember the way those eyes had been when Suzaku was a mere boy. When they would shine with a whirlpool of emotions. But not like this, not like this... Hard as the gem stone Lelouch loved to liken them to.

He waited on his feet silently, wavering gaze latched on the desolate streets seen from his window, frozen in the grays, blues and blacks of the night. Yet, his conscious couldn't escape from the man in his room whose presence did nothing but waver his composure, his carefully built act of aloofness towards his impending doom he meticulously devised by his very own hands.

It was too much.

Just as he was going to utter a dismissive command to his knight-for one more night- Suzaku slowly came in front of him. He stopped himself just before he bit his lip. He had to force a smile on his uncooperative features that were stuck on misery. Before he could succeed, he felt gloved fingers on his chin and his head was carefully turned towards Suzaku's.

Taken momentarily aback by the distance he saw in those eyes, he swallowed and smiled the most fake smile he ever mustered. He result was the wounding of that hand over his fragile neck, not choking him but daring him to smile much more fully.

Suzaku's eyes narrowed down with a heart felt anger upon seeing that smile on Lelouch's face. It was so crooked, so unreal, so hurtful... It was unsightly. How could he...? How could he still smile?

Lelouch opened his mouth to utter a few words of reassurance, that he was ready, that he didn't intend to betray to their promise, that he was willing for such a long time that he forgot...

Yet in fact, it was breaking him apart to think that Suzaku had come to solidify their arrangement, proving him that he didn't trust him even at this late hour that was so close to their final moments.

"Shut up!" Suzaku ordered, voice harsh and choked; he knew what Lelouch wanted to say. He didn't want to hear it. He didn't want to hear his first and only friend to assure him that he would stand tall as he waited for him to kill him tomorrow.

How much more of a monster could this man turn him out to be, force him to become, for his own ends?.. For his own selfishness again, just until the very end...

Lelouch's eyes widened at the command. His hands shakily rose up to the hand that was holding him in place. Hatred, anger... Those captivating eyes were full of them that he was choking on seeing them, looking at him like this. What did Suzaku expect him to do? He was already giving his life in his hands, wasn't he? What more ironic ending one could arrange for his own self other than Zero being killed by a Zero impostor who hated and swore to kill the very same person with his own hands? Couldn't Suzaku see that he was making his wish come true?

"Suzaku... I..." He began, not exactly knowing what to say, and was stopped by Suzaku's harsh lips that landed on his own.

_'Shut up... Just... Stop lying to me... These words at the tip of your tongue are not the ones I want to hear... Those looks in your eyes are not the ones I want to share in this final moment... I want to see my despair in you, mirrored in your eyes...'_

Lelouch's entire frame shook, his eyes wide open, lips frozen against the brutal kiss. He momentarily saw a green eye open, sharper than a knife, colder than ice as Suzaku harshly squeezed his jaw to open his mouth and his other hand started to rip away his white uniform.

_'Is this your parting gift, Suzaku? Such a twisted one at that...'_ Lelouch thought, realization dawning bitterly on him. As he opened up for him, his cold hands pressed themselves against Suzaku's chest, trying not to struggle within his grasp.

Their tongues met, Suzaku forced away a sob... Lelouch was just yielding to him, was not fighting back, was not demanding why... It hurt... He wanted him to struggle, to question him, to scold him, to humiliate him, to say him that he was equally heartless just like himself, never better, never the white knight he wished to become... But Lelouch was surrendering to him in a sickeningly cruel rehearsal of tomorrow...

His taste... Lelouch couldn't get enough, couldn't help but clutch on their contact. Suzaku was warm. He was so warm that it was scalding. Because... He thought that what fed Suzaku's passion was his hatred; this one final gift of his, or this one final blow from his no-longer-friend before he went down into the muds of history as the last Emperor of Brittania.

He had no pride left within him, not before this man, who was kissing and stripping him of his clothes as if tearing apart his all layers of lies, masks, and falseness...

_'Yes, bare me, Suzaku, bare me of everything that made us come to this point, become this... Bare me to my bones, burn away my fake layers... Until what remains of me is that small boy who promised to give you back your future... Oh, how sweetly disillusioned he was...'_

Suzaku firmly closed his eyes against the burning tears that demanded to flow. So much so that when Lelouch answered his kiss, softly, devoid of the brutality he was ravishing that mouth of his with, that he bit on Lelouch's lip to drown his sorrow by watching the pain he inflicted on Lelouch's face.

Yet when he drew back, his own lower lip crimson red with Lelouch's warm blood, he didn't see pain. There was a welcoming expression on Lelouch's face as if he was mocking him, just like he mocked every other person he met...

Not like this... Feeling the coppery taste in his mouth was much more cruel than the thought of painting Lelouch's blood on his hands tomorrow. His chest reverberated with a shudder of rage when he saw that sweet blood drip down from that sinfully smiling lips, down to that porcelain chin.

He saw red. Suzaku simply tore down the white under garment off of Lelouch's thin shoulders and pushed him back on to the cool bed sheets.

Lelouch just laid there, watching him shed his own uniform whilst their eyes were locked. Suzaku was moving like a big, elegant cat in the semi darkness of the room. Yet, Lelouch didn't feel afraid, didn't want to feel frightened. If Suzaku wanted to finally punish him one final time, so be it, he thought. He had nothing to spare, hide or save. If Suzaku wanted this, who was Lelouch to deny him? Maybe this would make it easier for him to face him tomorrow, knowing that he had given everything he could to this man, to his friend...

Suzaku approached the bed slowly, climbing on it and crawling on Lelouch who was still watching him with that resigned, mockingly peaceful expression, hair fanned out around his pale face, eyes shining under the moonlight, arms open for him to give an embrace he knew he neither deserved nor thought of as genuine.

This beautiful face would be no more, these violet eyes would gaze at him no more, these pale, skinny arms would embrace him no more... Yet, was it cruel of him that he desired to consume them so much, so achingly that the pain was gnawing at his chest, ripping his ribs apart, stabbing at his heart.

_'Don't mock me, Lelouch... Don't smile at me like that, don't open your arms to your to be murderer... Don't welcome me as if I am your personal grim reaper that you carefully chose to hand the scythe to tear your life from you...'_

Suzaku caressed his sides as if memorizing the feeling of them under his touch, their eyes still locked to each other's. He leaned in on his elbows, face quickly diving into the crook of his neck, taking in his scent deeply to engrave it to his brain. It was sweet, oh god, it was like poison. How he wished to lost his crumbling heart in its alluring scent...

He nipped the skin, practically chewing it between his teeth as if he could devour it to make it utterly and truly a part of his own. Lelouch whimpered and moaned in pain, but his trembling arms wounded themselves around his head, hugging those precious wavy brown locks to his chest, his fingers delving in their thickness to savor their texture, just like wheat spikes, hinted with a golden hue he cherished.

Suzaku's breathing was harsh as he licked, nipped, sucked on his unguarded neck, feeling Lelouch bend his head to give him more of himself to devour, to hurt, to love. His heart was giving up on him...

His hands, no longer caressing him carefully, started to grip him, grasp his flesh, pinch and roll it between his fingers... Lelouch was gasping, his breath hitching as if he was suppressing sobs, yet, he was not escaping. His back was arching on the bed against his chest to get closer, get so closer that as if he was trying to melt into him, be a part of him. Even though he hurt him, even though every touch left an angry mark on his skin. He knew Suzaku was branding him. Yet, he couldn't allow himself to think that Suzaku was branding him as his for one last time... Suzaku was simply laying a map of his sins on his flesh for the world to see after he would lay lifeless on the ground.

The pain was welcome, if it was inflicted by this man's touch...

Suzaku felt he was getting delirious. Not enough, just not enough... His hands couldn't feel enough, his tongue, his lips couldn't get enough of him... As he lapped Lelouch's blood off of his chin and lips, as their laboring breaths mingled to each other he felt he was close to losing his mind...

Literally...

His hands needed at least a decade, his lips needed at least fifty years, his burning body needed an age... Maybe then, by then, he would get enough of Lelouch to not miss this feeling... Yet, he knew he could never feel fed up with it...Never get tired of hearing his sweet voice moan and gasp, his deep eyes looking only at him, this graceful body writhing under him.

Lelouch was so lost. What did he have to do to remember smiling at his friend, assuring him that it was alright for him to do this, that he was willing to give all these to him, just to him... His eyes burned, he choked as they kissed again. He wanted to plead with him, plead that he would at least say his name as he rocked back and forth over his body, as he stripped him off of his mind, leaving a frightened, utterly desperate shell of it behind his wake. At least he wouldn't have to bear that crumbled heart anymore. Tomorrow it would be crushed, too.

Suzaku knew he was getting harsher and harsher by the second. He ground himself on the willing body below him, gripping, bruising his arms, tearing off black strands of hair as he forced Lelouch to give a reaction other than his artificial affections and acceptance.

He yanked away the button and the zipper on Lelouch's white pants as he bit and suck on his left nipple, savoring the choked sob it elicited from Lelouch.

He got rid of his own pants, too and leaned back, he stopped all movement suddenly.

Any more than this and he knew he was just going to rip Lelouch apart to shreds with his bare hands, just like an animal who would devour their mate whilst making love to them, confusing his desire to love with his desire to have a part of Lelouch for himself.

He was shaking, he was afraid, he was falling apart with the need. Was there no way to make Lelouch see how much devastation he inflicted on him? Was there no way to just turn his back and revel in the upcoming revenge he had so much wanted to take on this man? Was there no way to forget that he was the most foolish of all the people by loving him... This tyrant man... This... his Lelouch.

Lelouch didn't want to stop, not when he felt on the verge of tears. Did Suzaku not see him even worthy of taking his revenge on? Would Suzaku deny him of this, of this last illusion from their paradise lost?

_'Don't do this to me, Suzaku. Look at me, even if your eyes are only capable of regarding me with hatred and contempt... Please say something, look at me... Don't let this be our last memory together...'_

He reached to him, hesitantly, trembling with subsiding passion. His hand touched Suzaku's face and was quickly caught by his iron grip.

Suzaku rose his head, looked directly in his eyes and two tear drops tumbled down his cheeks as his grip wavered.

"Yell at me..." He murmured.

"Scold me... Degrade me... But, don't look at me like that, Lelouch." He whispered, his hand nearly breaking the thin wrist.

"Tomorrow, tomorrow I am going to kill you!" His voice ascended upto a scream.

"Tomorrow, I will rip your heart out and yet you smile at me! You open your arms to me, I hurt you, yet you caress me... Do you hate me this much to use your fake affections to spite me?"

He crawled back, freeing Lelouch of his weight and grip. He backed away, yet couldn't bring himself from looking at Lelouch's eyes, searching them as if looking for something mindlessly. He was choking on his own breath and words but, he didn't stop talking.

"Last night, Lelouch, this is our last night... Please show your true self to me at least here, at least when we are like this... Cry, dammit, yell, curse me... struggle... just do anything but... not this... Lelouch... please..."

And he broke down, shoulders shaking with harsh sobs, face distorted with pain and desolation... Just like when he had been little, when he had first tasted how life could be bitter and dark.

Lelouch stared back with an equally lost expression. Eyes swimming with unshed tears. He tried to sit to keep Suzaku from running away. His heart couldn't even bear the possibility of it.

"But, how could I, Suzaku?" He asked, suddenly seeing his ten years old childhood friend before him.

"How could I? When I am... When I had been..." He buried his face in his hands and sobbed as if he himself, too, returned back to those old days...

"When I have always been in love with you..."

There, he said it, for the first time and possibly for the last, as he silently cried his heart out. He raised his tear drenched face and looked at Suzaku who was watching him with wide, unblinking emerald eyes. Oh, he couldn't bear seeing disgust in them, pain gripped his frame as he approached him to embrace him.

Suzaku let it, too shocked to do anything. Yet his passivity broke Lelouch's heart in a million pieces.

"This embrace is real... Those smiles were real, Suzaku... They are just for you... Even if you never forgive me for everything I did, I am glad knowing that who had and will take my heart is you. We promised, remember, I will not back away from it. I am sorry to make you do this, but maybe, just maybe, I thought it could console you, too, knowing that you also will see the end of your promise by taking my life..."

Lelouch leaned away yet couldn't bring himself to break the contact. Suzaku was still, crying silently to himself. Lelouch bit his lip again as he slowly stroked Suzaku to fullness again. Fingers hesitant and shy, he placed soft kisses on his face and lips. His other hand hungrily traced the muscles on his back and arms.

Without even preparing himself he spread his legs on each side of Suzaku and lowered himself slowly on his hardness. He winced, feeling blood seep from his lip again, and his flesh tearing inside as he tried to join with Suzaku. His heart was painfully thudding in his chest but he smiled through his tears. He felt happy, just because Suzaku didn't stop him. Just because he didn't refuse him even if it was no longer love but pain he sought in their joining.

Suzaku was dazed... Something was snapped in him severing his touch on reality when he listened to Lelouch's words. He was... Oh, he had been so lost. This was too cruel, everything was too harsh and cold... He was fortune's fool, a toy to destiny... For he had waited to hear this for such a long time...

He looked up to see Lelouch smiling again, a genuine, happy smile. At that very moment he realized that he was deeply buried in his lover's body. Their gazes locked, Suzaku sobbed, the soft sound quickly turned into the wailing of a small child.

He embraced Lelouch so tightly, so fiercely that they both lost their breath. He was sobbing over Lelouch's name. The name he used to call him when they were kids.

"Lulu... Oh, Lulu...Why? Why, Lulu..."

Lelouch thought that he was about to reject him again. His chest tightened with pain.

"Please, Suzaku... Please let me have this... At least this... Hate me all you want, but please let me have this..."

Suzaku raised his head in alarm.

"Hate you?" He asked as if he was slapped. His eyes softened, clouded with a desperation he couldn't suppress.

"I... too... I have always loved you, Lelouch, always..."

Lelouch looked at him, stunned, eyes wide open with incomprehension.

"Say it again..." He mumbled.

"I love you, Lelouch..."

A sob wracked Lelouch's body. "Really?" He asked, smiling just like a child, forgetting the fact that this very same man was appointed by him to kill him tomorrow.

"With everything I have..."

Lelouch laughed with joy as he watched those emerald eyes look at him with the warmth he desired to see for so long.

"If so... Then make love to me, Suzaku... Just one last time..."

Suzaku leaned in to capture his lips as he slowly lowered him to the bed. Their bodies fit into each other more closely. Suzaku embraced him like he was the most precious, the most fragile thing in the whole world and feeling it made wonders to Lelouch's heart which was beating just like that of a warm rabbit's.

Slowly, carefully they shared a long, breathless kiss, lips dancing on each other as if hypnotized, eyes half closed yet still locked as they continued to bleed the sorrow of their hearts in moon-struck drops.

Suzaku slowly moved his hips, burying himself in his lover's tightness without disrupting their embrace. Their lips broke apart in choking breaths, as they tried to capture the other's puffing breaths into their lungs. They had never felt like this before, so lost in their sorrow as they made love to each other, clutching desperately on the pleasure that was building in them as a last life line to trace back into the reality of their shared moment, into each other's eyes back again.

It was so hard to keep it inside. Lelouch started to cry again as he watched Suzaku's face with such a longing in his eyes that undone Suzaku, too.

They showered each other with tear stained kisses as they brought each other closer to the bitter-sweet completion.

"Longer... Please, make it last longer, Suzaku... Not yet, don't let it end... Please..."

Lelouch was begging to live in that moment just a bit longer as if afraid of dying just when everything exploded in white lights behind his eyes.

"If I could..." Sobbed Suzaku on his own tores of completion, "If I could, I would make it last forever..."

They both stilled in each other's arms... As their breathing calmed down, Lelouch confessed, treading his shaky fingers in Suzaku's hair.

"I don't want to sleep, Suzaku..."

"I don't want to... close my eyes, too..."

"Then, don't leave me until the sun shines again..."

Suzaku kissed away Lelouch's tears but they continued to come down all the same mingling with his own.

"As you wish, love..."

_There were two kids on the slope of a muddy hill with pieces of tree branches in their hands, clashing them with each other as if they were mighty swords. The kids were yelling threats at each other as they laughed as if there was no tomorrow. _

_One was calling himself a knight, the other a prince. The poor prince was limping as if wounded and calling for help from his knight. And the other one quickly changed his dark cape that they made from old bed sheets into a white one and ran back to his prince's call, quickly stabbing the thin air in a mock duel, defeating the other bad knight._

_In this mock fight of theirs, he would turn back to his wounded prince, shouldering his weight by making him lean against his frame and smile victoriously, declaring that he once more saved his prince from the evil clutches of that dark knight which was in fact played by him again. _

_They would tread back to the old storeroom, the brown haired boy taunting the other about how weak he was and the black haired boy pouting and telling him that not every prince was destined to win without the help of their knight by their side._

_Their wooden swords and torn capes would be left behind on the muddy ground, the boys running back happily as if they won the greatest war of the history._

And tomorrow, when time had come to create their own history, Lelouch thought as he closed his eyes with a smile,

"_So, you forgot to change your cape, ne, Suzaku?..."_

_-_

**No ending notes, dammit Sunrise!!**


End file.
